Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by nrmitchi 1938 days ago
That's an interesting point actually.

For one, I suspect that ERCOT wouldn't allow a new company with this model access to the grid immediately, at least until this blows over a bit.

But regarding "thousands in debts"; I'm curious how that will be handled. It seems that these are debts to Griddy, but Griddy no longer exists, apparently for non-payment, which implies that ERCOT does not expect to be paid. Do these customers now owe this debt to ERCOT directly?
1 comments
dragonwriter 1938 days ago
> Griddy no longer exists

Griddy is shutting down. They exist for the moment, the debt they are owed is an asset, and even if they are dissolved their assets will be sold off to pay their creditors, so someone will be owed the money.

link
nrmitchi 1938 days ago
The customer debt from this can be sold off, but you might be lucky to get a penny-on-the-dollar for it.
link
dragonwriter 1938 days ago
Maybe, because it's going to (on average) be hard to collect. But the debt doesn't go away automatically or get reduced, it goes to whoever paid that penny...

(Now, if that's John Oliver [0], maybe it also gets forgiven, but that's not the usual case...)

[0] https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/john-oliver-buys-15...

link
toast0 1938 days ago
There's a statute of limitations on collecting debt. Looks like in Texas, it's 4 years. A creditor (or its assignees) can certainly take debtors to court and get a judgement, which would reset the statute. But that's a lot of expense, and may not be recouped.

If Griddy is booted out of ERCOT, Griddy (or its assignees) probably can't prevent them from switching to other providers with a balance due, and probably can't have their electricity turned off for non-payment, so for customers that ended up with a balance due in the thousands, I expect they'll have to write off a lot of that.

(I'm not a lawyer, if I was a lawyer, I wouldn't be admitted in Texas, I didn't even read the law, just a web page that looked appropriate)

link
unishark 1938 days ago
Presumably it would only cost a penny because whoever buys it doesn't expect to collect very much and will be motivated to negotiate.

It would be really nice if rather than taking a low amount they sell it directly to the debtors themselves for such a markdown, but I guess they'd think that sets a bad precedent.

link
nrmitchi 1938 days ago
Haha that's just what we need here, all of the "winter storm electricity" debt becoming (yes, a lower amount of) "income tax owed to the IRS" debt.
link